Senators vow to assist SEAL who killed bin Laden

David McCumber

Published 9:01 pm, Wednesday, February 13, 2013

WASHINGTON -- The case of the Shooter, the former SEAL who says he killed Osama bin Laden and is now facing great challenges as a civilian, sparked emotional reaction from several senators who said Wednesday the hero's plight is a perfect example of many flaws in the way the country treats its veterans.

They vowed to take congressional action.

The case of the anonymous member of SEAL Team 6, the elite black-ops unit sent to Afghanistan on a mission to bring bin Laden to justice in May 2011, was laid out in an Esquire magazine story that has been excerpted this week in Hearst Newspapers.

In the story, the shooter, who spent 16 years in the U.S. Navy, talked about the lack of help for those, like him, who leave the service before the 20-year pension threshold. Though he is eligible for five years of health care, his family is not; he has no pension; and his physical disability claim is trapped in the morass of the VA's nearly 900,000-case backlog.

On a visit to Capitol Hill Tuesday, the Shooter met with members of the leadership of both houses, who told him they were determined to tackle the problems his case represents.

The SEAL's name was withheld by Esquire, a Hearst property, because his role in the bin Laden case puts him in danger of being a terrorist target. He also has no protection for himself or his family.

"This is a veteran with uncommon skills, training, and bravery who is speaking out on the challenges common to all veterans," said Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., a member of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee. "From access to affordable health care, to waiting too long for benefits, to facing a job market that doesn't place enough value on his experience, he is navigating the same pitfalls all of our veterans are encountering in their transition home. At the same time, he also faces concerns specific to his situation, including a lack of protection for him and his family, that we need to address."

Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., the committee's chairman, said the panel would convene a hearing next month on the disability-claim backlog.

"It is simply not acceptable for any veteran to wait many months or years for the benefits that they are entitled to receive," he said. "We will do everything we can to make sure that a broken claims system is fixed."

For Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., another member of the committee, the case crystallizes three significant issues: Poor transition services for departing veterans; an outmoded pension system that needs reform to help retain more of the military's best performers as the postwar stand-down progresses; and the dysfunction and lack of communication the claims backlog represents.

The SEAL did not know he was eligible for five years of VA health care after separation. That points to a transition system that "is often pretty meager and inadequate," Blumenthal said. "Very often, decisions by retiring military are less than optimal because they don't know they have to opt in to a particular program" that might fit their needs, because it wasn't explained to them well enough. "DoD sees its responsibility ending the day someone leaves active duty. The VA sees its responsibility beginning. It's the same person -- there ought to be a continuum."

The Pentagon has already reviewed the inequities of the military retirement system, with a task force report to the secretary of defense in 2011 that recommended a variety of changes. "The current military retirement system is unfair," the task force concluded.

Only 17 percent of the all-volunteer force serves more than 20 years and qualifies for a lifetime pension benefit, the report said. The panel recommended a new structure for military retirement, with both GIs and the Pentagon making annual contributions to the equivalent of an individual retirement account, featuring matching government contributions of as much as 16 percent of annual military base pay for each rank.

In addition to the enormous disability-claim backlog, Blumenthal pointed to the unsuccessful efforts to merge the medical records of DoD and the VA.

"After spending one billion dollars on this effort, recently (Defense) Secretary (Leon) Panetta and (Veterans Affairs) Secretary (Eric) Shinseki announced that they would no longer have the immediate goal of making these systems compatible. One billon dollars later! . . . They have kicked the can down the road.

"After every major conflict in this country's history, the military is hollowed out," Blumenthal said. "We lose our very best and most able when we reduce numbers because we disregard the importance of keeping the best ¦ the retirement system works against us."

"Taking care of our nation's veterans, their families and survivors is our highest priority," the VA said in a statement. "All combat Veterans who served in Iraq and Afghanistan are entitled to receive comprehensive medical care from VA with no co-pay for service-related conditions for five years after the date of their discharge or release."

Eve Burton, senior vice president and general counsel of the Hearst Corporation., who accompanied the shooter to the meetings with congressional leaders, said, "This man is a hero twice -- for what he did on active duty, and again for taking a stand on issues important to all the military, particularly those who perform the most dangerous of missions for our country."